


Flowers are sweet, your smile is sweeter. (I'll take either over rations anyday.)

by GlytheSector



Category: Star Wars: The Old Republic
Genre: Aromantic Character, Friends With Benefits, Friendship, Gen, Misunderstandings, Pansexual Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-03
Updated: 2014-06-03
Packaged: 2018-02-03 07:29:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1736264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlytheSector/pseuds/GlytheSector
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A daring Captain faces many a challenge but few more daunting than military issue rations and a misunderstood gift.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flowers are sweet, your smile is sweeter. (I'll take either over rations anyday.)

**Author's Note:**

> This story features my female smuggler Captain Trazah Kellos. Spoilers for whole smuggler crew and finale of act 1 revelations about a crew member.

“Oh whoopee ration packs again. Republic military issue even, it sure is fine dining on this ship tonight!” Captain Trazah Kellos, daring smuggler extraordinaire wrinkled her nose in distaste at her meal. Tired after a busy day she’d had a quick blast in the ‘fresher and was now sitting about in some old clothes hoping to relax and enjoy some delicious food. No luck there. Bowdaar and Guss sat on the couch using the dejarik table for a round of Pazaak, while she sat on the chair she’d pulled over so she could watch the game and rest her food on the holocommunicator. Bowdar grunted in agreement, proper food for a Wookie was hard to come by in a lot of the ports they went through.

“You’ve got all these plants” Guss said, gesturing vaguely with his cards at the explosion of vines, flowers, mosses and fungi that grew out of a haphazard collection of containers around the room. “Can’t you just eat them?” Trazah sighed, scratching an irritating patch of skin on her arms where some new tattooing was being a pain in the ass.

“Hello? Carnivore here. I eat plant life which I do NOT have the enzymes for by the way and my digestive system will get gummed up like a freighter covered in mynocks.”

“Sorry.” Guss said, not sounding particularly sorry, and certainly not distraught enough to consider looking away from his game. “I forgot. You and humans and Twi’leks and all those sorts look so alike. Hard enough to remember the best ways how to con you , never mind what food you eat.”

Trazah had to laugh at that. Guss had her beat for sheer shamelessness when it came to his criminal ways. “Tell that to the Imps,” She smirked. “I’d be able to deal so much easier in more sectors if they couldn’t tell me apart from humans.” Guss joined her in laughing, though his sounded more like a cross between ribbiting and hiccups. Staring at her ration pack she gave up on hoping it would become more appetising and resolved to eat it as fast as possible. Tearing into her food Trazah was surprised to hear Bowdaar’s rumbling chuckle. “Something funny big guy?”

Bowdaar grumpfed his assent “ _I have heard tales that on the moons of Sarapin there is a many-limbed creature called a Vapaad. Brave hunters try to hunt stalk this beast but often find themselves a meal for it. I imagine its feeding frenzy would look something like yours_.” He teased.

Trazah thought about this while she chewed and swallowed. “If it’s so dangerous why in the galaxy does anyone hunt them? They valuable or something?”

Bowdaar shrugged. “ _For honour and glory they say. I heard fighters say such things as a gladiator fighting for the Hutt but they were lies. There was no glory fighting for him._ "

Stretching over she patted the Wookie on an arm. “No worries Bowie, can’t promise much honour or glory hereabouts, but there’s credits, laughs and you don’t fight anyone you don’t want to.” The Wookie laughed and held her hand for a moment, his eyes conveying his appreciation before he turned back to his game.

With a clanging of armoured footsteps Corso strode into the room just as she’d taken another bite. “Hey Corso” she greeted, accidentally spraying him with chunks of food and spit.

“Ugh, that's gross Captain.” She rolled her eyes at him before stretching her mouth wide open, giving him a view of sharp dentition, chewed meat and her tongue which she waggled at him in taunt. The kid just rolled his eyes back as he began to rummage through their kitchen unit. Disappointed about what he found there he leaned back against it and complained, “Geez captain didn’t you just eat a few hours ago? Not like any of us are getting much exercise cooped up on the ship like this.”

She snorted with laughter, “Listen kid, I could eat enough food to make my ass the size of a Valor class cruiser, with thighs like Thranta class corvettes to match. And you know what? So long as I had enough credits left over from that food bill to pay for fuel, and to keep my blasters and med-bay stocked up I wouldn’t give a damn.” Finishing she slapped a wide tattooed thing for emphasis. “ So seeing as I’m such a generous gal what with letting you live on my ship without paying a damn thing, and giving you a fair cut on the credits we earn, I don’t see how it’s any of your business how much I eat.”

"Uh sure Captain whatever you say. Gotta admit I’m surprised though. Just seeing as you seem to be the kind of woman who enjoys mens' attention is all.” Out of the corner of her eye Trazah saw Guss and Bowdaar exchange a look over their cards at the edge in Corso’s voice when he talked about her “enjoying men’s attention.” Bowdaar facepalmed with a large furry paw while Guss grinned (as much as a Mon Cal could grin) and leaned forwards. Though maybe he was leaning in to sneak a peek at Bowdaar’s cards rather than in anticipation of Corso getting a telling off. Maybe it was both.

Never one to disappoint an audience Trazah leaned back in her chair, watching the human carefully with her best Sabaac face till he began to squirm. “Kid, a word of advice. One, never tell someone else what they can or can’t eat, makes you look like you got all the manners of a pig lizard. You’re the one always going on and on about how you were raised right, maybe you should act like it.” She patted her blaster slightly as the boy looked like he was about to interrupt. “And second of all, doesn’t matter their species or their gender, if someone tries to tell me what to do to for the sake of me being attractive to them? They can go stick their dicks or whatever part of them that's softest into a damn Sarlaac pit for all I care.” Corso winced at that one, he obviously remembered their trek out to the pit on Tatooine. It had been a morbid job to toss a grenade in to put the creature’s victims out of their misery. Not somewhere he wanted to put his “personal cannon” apparently. Ugh, knowing the kid’s weird tendency for naming weapons she wouldn’t be surprised if he named it. Trying not to snigger she stood up grabbing her wrappers to toss into the trash compactor.

“Bleh.” She groaned. “That was just plain nasty. I’d rather gargle Hutta sewage before trying that type of pack again. Someone remind me to buy some different supplies next time, I’d kiss a Sith’s creepy, veiny, dark-side glowing buttcheeks right now for some Iridonian kebabs.” As her mouth watered at the idea of fresh food Corso pulled a look of disgust, while Bowdaar laughed harder and Guss looked suspiciously thoughtful.

“I know a guy on Nar Shaada that.” He stopped suddenly, surprised by Trazah bounding across the room and covering his mouth with her hand.

“Don’t even go there.” She said. “I just ate.” Guss’ large eyes rolled in indignation at her, but he stayed quiet when she released him. At least until he saw the cards Bowdaar had laid down triumphantly. Then he popped out of his chair and began to swear with a fluency, imagination and variety that even impressed her. She thought she even heard some Sith’a’ri in there as well, she definitely didn’t want to know on what adventure he’d have picked that up.

Deciding to leave them to it, she bounced out of the room with a cheery wave that only Corso returned, the others were too absorbed in their bickering and accusations of cheating. Swinging her arms along and whistling, she checked the med-bay to make sure seetoo was sterilising it from the aftermath of their unfortunate encounter with some K’lor slugs earlier. Some genius had been smuggling what he thought was a crate of priceless Sith artifacts off of Korriban, when instead he’d gotten a cargo hold full of the planet’s second least friendly residents. The Sith had the slugs beat but not by much. The things had gotten loose at the last spaceport and caused havoc, spitting slime and acid everywhere. She’d gotten a nice discount off the port owner for clearing them out but the crew had looked like they’d gone through several rounds with a Rancor with a really bad cold afterwards.

Satisfied that the droid was getting the mess under control with a minimum of fussing for once, she continued down the corridor. After the day she’d had a nice lie down sounded good, while listening to the latest holodiscs from the Kaas city opera as she did so sounded even better. If she was lucky Corso would still be wary from his telling off and not give her hassle about her taste in music. Not that she gave a womp rat’s ass about his opinion on her music, but whining didn’t exactly blend harmoniously with opera. That plan was not to be however, as a familiar and imperious voice called out from the engine room.

“Captain? I can hear that’s you, in here now.” Recognising the tone of voice Trazah quickly hurried in. There stood the future Queen of Dubrillion, daughter of the galaxy’s most infamous crime lord and heir to a lost dynasty. Her hair was falling out of its usual elegant style and loose wisps were plastered onto her dark forehead with sweat. Yet standing in oily spare clothes with her hands on her hips and an expression that would have an Alderaanian noble impressed Risha somehow managed to look every bit a queen. The engine room might be her sole domain for the time being but she ran it with the ruthlessness of a Hutt. When she looked at the Captain like that, it normally meant Trazah had in some well-meaning or teasing way incurred her wrath.

Wracking her mind for whatever offence she may have committed, Trazah quickly chose to go for a charm approach. “Hey Rish,” She smiled sweetly at the unimpressed human. “What can I do for my favourite royal today? Want a drink from the kitchen? Need some thrilling heroics? Or do you just want me to brighten up the room with my sparkling personality and gorgeous face?” As usual Risha seemed marvellously impervious to the Captain’s famous charm. Lifting a single eyebrow she slowly pointed to the captain’s left besides the sleeping roll she used instead of the crew quarters, if she wasn’t interested in joining the Captain that evening. Looking down however nothing seemed out of place. Turning back to Risha in confusion she began to ask what was wrong before she was interrupted

“That!” Risha said in a flat voice, with nostrils flaring she indicated, a pink painted fingernail jabbing in the direction of what seemed to Trazah to be a perfectly inoffensive bunch of flowers sitting innocently in a vase.

“What about “That?”” the captain asked, mimicking Risha’s strange tone. The human glared her down for a moment before she seemed to realise Trazah wasn’t being deliberately obtuse.

“I thought I told you,” she began, “about growing your plants in the engine room. No moulds, no moss, no vines, no flowers. I don’t care if the heat is good for them, if it’s that important buy an incubator to grow them in. We don’t need a repeat of the Rylothian fungus incident do we?”

“Weeeeeeeeell see that was actually wasn’t a fungus not by most galactic botany standards. It’s called a fungus because.” She stopped quickly, working out from Risha’s eloquent stare that she didn’t require a lecture on the finer points of xenobotany. “Well the point is yes, I remember that fiasco and no I don’t want to have to scrape purple slime that stinks like a wet Taun-Taun out of the engine again. So no worries there your highness.”

Risha sighed in frustration. “If that’s the case Trazah then please explain why there appears to be flowers in my engine room?”

“What’s the matter? Don’t you like them?” Trazah looked in admiration at the flowers, the light pink blush of the outer petals, the deep pink heart that was the smaller petals cradling the stamen. Delicate veins traced the petals and the firm stems disappearing into the vase. The scent was pleasant, a tad overpowering for her taste but human noses were less sensitive than her own.

“Well yes actually, they are lovely, but that’s not the point.” She stopped abruptly, looking from Trazah to the flowers. Always quick on the uptake she put two and two together. “Wait you got them for me? As a gift?”

Discomforted by the confusion in Risha’s voice Trazah nodded seriously. “Well yeah. They’re from Dubrillion. I know you like travelling as much as I do. But I thought you would like something from your future home. To remind you where you’re going I suppose. Besides,” she teased, “Aren’t beautiful women supposed to be showered with flowers?”

Risha didn’t look pleased by the explanation. “Captain,” she said looking serious. “I like you. We make an excellent team, you’ve been a good business partner, I certainly enjoy sleeping with you on occasion and you are a better friend than I could have imagined.”

“Is it just me hearing a but there? Cause there’s definitely a but. Now normally I like butts, I have an excellent one myself if I do say so. But this but is making my butt really nervous.”

“Captain.”

“Yeeeeees?”

“Why are you giving me these flowers?”

Trazah frowned, certain by this point she was missing a good chunk of the conversation's context. “The reasons I said? I like you and I thought you would like them that’s all. Why is there something wrong with that?”    

“Not wrong no.” Bending down Risha picked one of the flowers gently out of the vase. She held it close, inhaling its scent before looking at the captain with an apologetic expression. “You’re right they are lovely. Thank you. It was very thoughtful of you.” Lightly stroking the petals she continued in the same soft tone. “I’m not used to people giving me something without wanting something back in return. There’s nothing wrong with that, business is how the galaxy works. But something like this, it’s well oddly charming.”

“You’re very welcome Rish.” Glad to have the issue sorted she smiled at Risha. Despite the small smile she received in return the woman still looked troubled.

“I suppose I was more bothered just there by the idea I'd been fooled rather than anything else.” Catching Trazah’s frown she hastened to explain. “I just meant that you told me that you weren’t really interested in people romantically back when I joined the ship. Giving flowers is seen as a romantic gesture to humans, you’re a dear friend and I care about you a lot. ” She gave a slightly tired sigh. “Which I didn't exactly expect when we first teamed up. A lot of how things have turned out haven't been what I planned. Not knowing exactly what’s coming next, being able to plan and cheat to get what I want? That worries me Captain. Thinking that you had managed to trick me hurt too, and not just my ego.” The last sentence turned teasing but Trazah was still frozen in place.

“Let me get this straight. Humans are so weird that they can’t fathom the idea of giving a person they love in a non- romantic way a fragging plant? To the extent that you, who should damn well know me better thought I was lying about myself?” She threw her hands up in the air in frustration. “That is the single most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard after the price of a Correlian cocktail in the Carrick station cantina!“

Risha laughed at the Captain’s dismay. “Well some people think the human obsession with sex and romance comes from the desire to increase the species.”

The Captain stared aghast. “But that makes even less sense? There are humans who don’t like sex, or have sex with people they can’t procreate with. And aliens need to “increase the species” too you know. Yet Zabraks at least seem to be able to figure out that sex and romance aren’t always this big mystical, intrinsically linked bundle that humans seem to think they are. Not for everyone anyways. Like we even have a word for people we love deeply but don’t love romantically. It’s no less special than the word for romantic love to us.”

“Oh?” Risha asked amused by the usually laid-back smuggler’s enthusiasm. “What is this word then?”

“Well it means that the person holds your heart basically. And yes more than person can hold it before there’s any more human weirdness. It’s not really that different to how humans express stuff. Just you know, less damn weird.”

“Just the one heart?” She asked curiously. “You have two don’t you?”

“Well yeah, cause if we lose a heart we can still live, it’s not pleasant but ain’t fatal either.” She caught Risha’s look, “Hey Iridonia is a harsh place, it taught us some valuable crap way back in the day.”

The human smirked, “Actually I wasn’t judging, I think it’s rather sensible. Simple, pragmatic, yet strangely sweet.”

Trazah bowed flamboyantly. “So glad to have you approve your highness.”

“As you should be. I heard your complaining earlier from here you know. So tell me Captain, how by all the stars are you capable of finding a rare flower from a world caught in civil war, but not able to remember to stock your kitchen with anything more appetising that military rations, protein shakes and caf drinks?”

Trazah shrugged and pulled her best modest face. “What can I say? I’m not really an all the details and priorities kinda gal. Isn’t that why I keep you around after all?”

Risha snorted at her false modesty. “And here I thought it was my brilliant engineering skills, great beauty and sharp business savvy.”

She grinned “Well those too I guess. And one can never have too many lovely ladies aboard a ship.”

“Clearly. Although I will say, I don’t see you giving anyone else here flowers Captain."

“Guss would sell them if he thought he could make a quick credit, Bowdaar thinks they're pretty but hates pollen getting stuck in his fur and Akaavi….. Do Mandalorians like flowers? The Captain paused thoughtfully stroking her chin.

“I don’t know” Risha shrugged. “Personally I’ve never had the occasion to ask. You should try, you’ve no self-preservation instincts anyway.”

“It’s a plan, as soon as she comes back from her mega revenge rampage I’ll ask."

“What about Corso?” She asked smirking, “No flowers for him?”

Trazah shuddered. “I’d rather dance naked on Hoth thanks. Although maybe hiding a Kasshyyk death plume in his room would be funny, the smell would drive him mad.”

“Please give me sufficient warning if you do, I’d like to have time enough to move my belongings out of the crew quarters and away from that mess before it happens.” Twirling the flower in her hands Risha frowned. “Hang on you said Guss would sell flowers for a quick credit. Why didn’t you think that of me?”

Darting in for a quick kiss Trazah winked as she began to stroll out of the engine room. “It’s because my dear Risha, under all that cynicism and mercenary behaviour I believe you have a sentimental streak.”

“Hmph. Keep dreaming Captain.”

“I never stop” With a last wave Trazah headed off down the corridor to go enjoy that music. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Risha hold the flower close for a moment and smile.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed my fic. I'm new to putting my fic out for others to read so any input/feedback or criticism is much appreciated.  
> I found it suprisingly difficult to illustrate that trazah is pansexual and aromantic without having her friendship and sexual relationship with Risha getting dismissed with what sounded like "no homo" nonsense.  
> Risha may seem a tad out of character, the crime lord queen is difficult to capture the voice of. If she sounds surprisingly affectionate this story is meant to take place in chapter 3 so hopefully that makes sense.  
> And yes Trazah is body type 4.  
> And yes she gives Corso a lot of shit, it's not because she hates him but because he can be an ass.


End file.
